


running red lights

by cloudtalking



Series: an offer you couldn’t refuse [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mob, Car Chases, M/M, bombs & bullets & boys oh my, die mad at it, is gaara ooc?? maybe idk he has a crush, kurama is uncle dangerous, op has never been to a KFC, op is failing chemistry and doesnt kno how molotov cocktails are made, sns is implied but if this ended up a long fic it'd be sng and that's tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 14:28:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17245859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudtalking/pseuds/cloudtalking
Summary: for the prompt for the naruto year end bash: Gaara has stolen a car outside the KFC. Naruto was in the passenger's seat. He still has not received his potato wedges (via virtuissimo)“Be quiet,” the stranger demands. It’s an order Naruto’s always had a problem with, but he’s sure as hell listening now. “I have three people on my tail, and I don’t know this area. I didn’t mean to pick you up, but now that I have you, you’ll help me.”Naruto, in a moment of a complete lack of self preservation, thinks that there’s nothing that would piss Shikamaru off more than leaving the KFC with an armful of food and having nowhere to put it down.





	running red lights

**Author's Note:**

> ayyy first nart fic and already a mob au im living large
> 
> naruto is kinda,,, a criminal and so is everyone else idk there's so much worldbuilding that i did i might make it a series lmao have fun!!!

Shikamaru, Chouji, and Kiba leave Naruto in the car when they go into the KFC, and Naruto would complain except he knows his reputation proceeds him enough that he’s probably already on the ban list despite never entering the building. The only place he’s safe is Ichiraku’s, and that’s only because old man Teuchi was the only store-owner he respected enough as a kid not to steal from.

He feels a bit like a five year-old, but then again in this group he might as well be. They only pulled over because of his and Kiba’s chanting, to which Shika limited them each to a kid’s meal and a large coke to _share—_ a deal Chouji was under no circumstances subject to, the fucker, who smiled at his boyfriend because he knew he had him whipped— and okay, they’re a family with two tired gay dads and two ADD kids, but it works.

Regardless, Kiba gets to follow the two vaguely responsible members of the group into the KFC, and Naruto is left bouncing his knee and trying to find a decently ridiculous radio station to annoy the others with when they deign to return. He’s only just starting to think it might be taking a bit long when a red blur yanks open the driver’s side door, slamming it behind them, turns the key in the ignition, and pumps the gas.

The shriek Naruto makes is just this side of too close to a little girl’s, but saying that out loud would probably summon Sakura with her fist raised, and that in itself is a bit more terrifying than the situation.

At least until the red-haired stranger turns a gun on him.

Naruto’s hands shoot up immediately into surrender. “Holy fuck.”

The stranger doesn’t even bother to look at him, keeping one hand on the wheel and both eyes on the road. Were it a movie, Naruto would already be chatting up Kiba about how much of a power move that is, but this is real life and the only words he can force out of his mouth are expletives, of which he’s spitting a fair amount.

“Be quiet,” the stranger demands. It’s an order Naruto’s always had a problem with, but he’s sure as hell listening now. “I have three people on my tail, and I don’t know this area. I didn’t mean to pick you up, but now that I have you, you’ll help me.”

Naruto, in a moment of a complete lack of self preservation, thinks that there’s nothing that would piss Shika off more than leaving the KFC with an armful of food and having nowhere to put it down.

“Might as fucking well,” he says, wearing the grin his uncle calls an _Uzumaki Guarantee._ The hair gets the honor of being a warning, one that Naruto (unfortunately for everyone else) doesn’t come with. “Where you wanna go?”

The stranger’s heavily-lined eyes (really, what the fuck kind of early-2000s emo shit is this dude on to do what even Sasuke wouldn’t stoop to) widen just a bit before the cracks in his mask heal over and erase the personality.“Wind country, as fast as we can get there discreetly.”

Naruto chokes on his spit even as he directs the stranger down a sharp turn into the less-congested parts of the city. He can navigate Konoha with both his eyes stabbed out in the middle of a hurricane, having spent his childhood doing something close to it. He knows every hand and foothold to jump to, every back alley escape route, every seedy bar or restaurant just th1is side of unpleasant enough to serve an Uzumaki. Konoha is his city in the way it can’t be anyone else’s, but however much his godfather forces him to travel, he’ll never have that same familiarity with anywhere else. Wind country, Naruto has to admit, is _very very_ far away from his sphere of influence.

“I can totally do that,” he lies. “Take the next left.” Google maps better pull through.

They’re officially at the point in the chase where Naruto can tell without any doubt which cars are the ones they’re trying to get away from. A black maserati— which is stereotypical at best but holy shit he wants to steal it— and a red one of the same make. From what he can tell, they each have at least two people in the front, though they’ve been lucky not to be close enough for him to see into the back.

“Why are they after you?” he asks in between directions, gesturing for the stranger to go down one of the dirtier streets— the one Naruto’s apartment is on, actually— and make a sharp turn through a narrow alley that scratches the paint enough that Naruto knows Shikamaru is going to kill him.

“I’ve taken over my father’s business.” _Business_ comes out of the stranger’s mouth the same heavy way _police_ comes out of Sasuke’s and _family_ comes out of Kurama’s (Sasuke coming from the biggest bloodline in Konoha’s law enforcement gets in the way of whatever _friendshiprivalryrelationship_ they have enough to make him sore about it whenever Kurama reminds him of what exactly his family name really means, but he hasn’t seen Sasuke since he transferred to Oto, and he really doesn’t need to be missing him right now). “In doing so, I drove him out of Suna. This is his objection.”

“Suna?” Naruto muses. The city is more full of tourists than people, and the people that do live there are either broke or rich to the point of it being ridiculous. Those in between make their money in blood, a kind of work Naruto’s own hands have been drenched in since his uncle picked him up off the streets.

The stranger makes a sound that’s considering more than judgemental, though it’s a fair bit of both. “My name is Gaara No Sabaku.”

“Oh, fuck,” Naruto responds without thinking— which is definitely a pattern at this point— because _oh fuck._

Regular titles are one thing, enough of a warning to steer clear even if you don’t recognize them. A title you recognize is a warning you’ve heard a million times and learned well enough to know you’re dead if you piss them off. But _No Sabaku,_ or _of the sand_ , is the title given to the members of one of the most powerful crime families in Suna. Although Kurama never managed to beat the names of all of the members into Naruto, he sure as hell knows this one. _Gaara No Sabaku_ , the youngest Kazekage— king of the Suna underground— and the highest kill count of any Kazekage so far.

“They kill their kages in Suna, to ascertain ascension” Kurama told him once, under the dim lighting of another temporary apartment Naruto sparsely remembers. “Not nearly as often as Kiri, so many forget, but it’s important to remember that the sand under the throne is bloody.”

Now, Naruto can only stare at the single most dangerous man in wind country and feel his previous confidence bleed out of his ass before he can stem the flow. He’s a goddamned Uzumaki, if the scars on his face from his uncle aren’t enough of a badge of honor. He’s a force to be reckoned with, the son of the fourth Hokage and heir to all of his mother’s legacy on top of everything Kurama made him. What he isn’t-- at least, not yet-- is a motherfucking Kage.

Gaara clicks his tongue in distaste, drawing Naruto back to the present like nothing else. “No more bravado? It was almost entertaining.”

That’s a challenge if he’s ever heard one.  His smirk comes back to him in no time, and he leans back in his seat so as to properly assess his challenger. Gaara is terrifying, but his red hair and green eyes are just the kind of vivid Naruto likes, and he’s just the right kind of dangerous to fuel his fire.

“Just didn’t expect to be running with a kage anytime soon, that’s all,” he says as if it’s nothing, as if he didn’t go from fearful to stupidly courageous in no time at all.

Gaara huffs as if he doesn’t believe him. “I’ll dump you when we get to the border,” he says like it’s a comfort. “You won’t have to be anymore involved than this.”

“Hell no,” Naruto grins as they exit the city— Shikamaru is going to rip his dick off and choke him with it and no one will be the wiser. A team of Nara lawyers coupled with Akimichi butchers and Yamanaka “sanitation” workers to hide the evidence and Naruto will have never existed— “I ain’t ‘boutta bail just as it’s getting good, no chance.”

“Then take the gun and start shooting at our tail,” Gaara says, taking a left. “We should have already lost them by now.”

Naruto rolls his eyes. “Keep your gun, they might pull up now that the roads are wider. I’d rather you not get your skull blown out.” He opens up the glove compartment and takes out the glock Shikamaru keeps for emergencies, not paying much attention to the face Gaara makes when he cocks it (which is funny as hell, actually). There’s two more in the back and loads of shit Naruto can’t even begin to comprehend in the trunk— the Nara family is never to be caught unawares after all, especially with enough money invested in the police that they never have to worry about conflict. He unbuckles his seatbelt, rolls down the window, sticks enough of his body out to aim properly, and starts shooting.

He loses the red easy enough, six shots to the wheels and one to the windshield and the car is veering off the road. The black is a bit smarter, the person in the passenger seat pulling out their own pistol and shooting wildly.

“Fuck,” Naruto curses as he _just barely_ dodges a bullet. “Okay, fuck this. Gimme a hot second.”

He can hear Gaara’s mumbled cursing, proof he’s at least somewhat phased by the firefight, as he crawls into the backseat and reaches into the trunk, fumbling around until his hand meets home. “Fucking _sweet_.”

“Anytime now would be nice,” Gaara calls back, even as he’s swerving and turning violently to try and avoid the shots.

“You can’t rush this shit, dude,” Naruto retorts, drenching cloth in gasoline and pulling out a bottle of beer. “Bombs are fucking delicate, you know!”

“What even— _bombs?_ ”

Naruto laughs, because that’s the fucking kicker, and he’s been waiting for this all day. His smile is violent and he makes sure Gaara is staring at him through the mirror when he says: “It’s an Uzumaki specialty.”

Then he throws the bottle out the window in the path of the black maserati, and Gaara books it so fast Naruto thinks his neck might snap.

Green fire, blossoming brilliant and proud from where it hit the pavement and blocking anything else from sight. It’s beautiful, and it only gets better when he hears the maserati crash against the road, having been thrown violently by the bomb.

“That’s not a Molotov cocktail,” Gaara notes, and Naruto has to give him credit for how little his voice wavers. Shikamaru had spent a full half hour cussing him out before he remembered how much less effort just accepting his talents could be. Kiba had grinned, because the Inuzuka will never forget the Uzumaki even if the rest of Konoha has tried their damnedest to do just that, and Chouji had just gone with it as the fucking angel he is.

“It is,” Naruto allows, “just spicy.”

 _“Spicy,”_ Gaara repeats. People are often reduced to echoes after being exposed to Uzumaki genius, so he doesn’t hold it against him.

“Uzumaki Naruto.” He sees the realization dawn on Gaara and has to smile, flashing his warmest eyes-closed grin. “At your service, Kazekage.”

Gaara’s cute little face is so thoroughly blindsided that Naruto can only be reminded of a cat in the presence of a vacuum cleaner. At that point he bypasses all rules of social conduct Sakura has ever tried and failed to teach him and gives in to the urge to cup his cheek, Gaara’s just too adorable for restraint.

“Marry me,” Gaara says, and it’s hard to tell if he’s serious or not by how absolutely deadpan his face is. It could be a joke, or a ploy for a political wedding, or maybe he’s just that attracted to him, but whatever it is it should be fun. Naruto laughs and switches his arm from Gaara’s face to his shoulder. “Maybe once we’re in Suna, yeah?”

He’s never seen Shikamaru’s little car go so fast before.

**Author's Note:**

> hope y'all liked it!! and if not thas not my problem i write for free but thx anyway ily


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